Lawmakers Demand To Know Why James Comey Has Been Silent Over Russian Collusion

You remember James Comey. He’s the FBI director who interfered with the 2016 presidential election by pretending the Clinton email investigation had been reopened when in fact there was nothing to reopen, leading the public to believe Clinton had, in fact, done something she shouldn’t have done, and nothing could have been further from the truth. Comey’s actions contributed materially to the secretary’s shocking loss to the man now occupying the White House.

Now, however, as lawmakers attempt to get a handle on the Russian scandal dogging the Trump gang, the spotlight is once again shining on FBI Director James Comey who has been oddly quiet on investigations into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and other potentially corrupt Trump officials.

According to The Hill, congressional Democrats have a few questions they want to put to the FBI director and he “better have a good answer.”

Comey came under extreme scrutiny after he released information on a possible investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton just days before the election that turned out to be nothing and yet was felt by many to influence the election. Comey’s actions at that time were criticized for going against a longstanding Justice Department policy of not discussing investigations so close to an election.

Addressing the revelation that Flynn had been in conversations with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) posed the Watergate question of ‘What did the president know and when did he know it?’ That question became the order of the day during the Watergate hearings, and, when finally answered, resulted in the resignation of President Richard Nixon.

“The much bigger issue is, what is the connection with Russia and the Trump administration? It’s not only how far up does it go — was the campaign in collusion?” Nadler asked. The congressman was asked if he trusted the FBI to properly investigate the Russian connection to the election, whereupon he replied, “I don’t know.”

Even Republicans, fond of placing party over patriotism, now have grave concerns with House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) wondering what exactly is going on and whether the FBI has any answers as part of their investigation.

“I expect for the FBI to tell me what is going on, and they better have a good answer,” Nunes said.

The infamous Darrel Issa (R-CA), Former House Oversight Committee chairman, also has problems with how Comey is responding to the questions about the investigation, saying, “He twice made the decision that in light of the high public awareness, to try to clear the air — and no air got cleared.”

With regard to Comey’s blunder in discussing the Clinton investigation, Issa added, “I’m not going to disagree that he will live by that experience of, no matter what his reasons, it did not advance the trust in the FBI when he was honest and forthcoming.”

The FBI director met in private with Trump in January to discuss Russian involvement in the election at which time he presented him with a controversial dossier prepared by a former British spy.

Trump has since asked Comey to stay on as the FBI director, and, in light of recent events, should come as no surprise to anyone.